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Originally Posted by Jedi Ninja
You have just hilighted the biggest problem with these programs. People believe that they've paid their fair share and are entitled to get full benefits back. In fact, the money they have paid in is not sufficient to cover the benefits that they're hoping to get back at retirement. People have not paid their fair share. The program is able to function only because there has, up until now, been more people paying into the programs than claiming. As that balance shifts, the program will not have enough money.
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Did you read the second paragraph of my post which clearly states SS is running a surplus? Money the government has spent elsewhere, but that's not social security's problem. Social security is set up to pay full benefits until 2035.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cowboy89
The days when a first world country has the financial means to care for its old, poor, and sick in the traditional sense are over, for fiscal and demographic reasons. Social security and medicare was all fine and dandy when there was numerous workers per retiree. Demographically this has changed and will continue to change for the negative. Bottomline this was a ponzi scheme. CPP is a ponzi scheme in Canada. Europe and Japan are utterly crumbling under the weight of their aging populations and lavish social programs. The jig is up, and discussions about what the US can afford and how it can be distributed is now.
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The wealthiest Americans have been hording the entirety of the United States' economic growth for the past 20 or so years. Their wealth has exploded while the middle class has remained stagnant. There is plenty of money to go around and to fund these programs. I resent conservatives feigning responsibility rhetoric while the middle class gets bent over.
Many of you might not realize the state of America's poor but leaving them to fend for themselves is so dramatically stupid. These people have close to nothing and they are getting more and more pissed off. Beyond that, more and more Americans are being pushed out of the middle class and becoming poor. You're risking the economic health and political stability of the world's only Democratic super power, for no good reason.